Sunday, July 01, 2007

Planets...Stars...Galaxies..Full Moon = FUN

The three of us had a fabulous night last evening....we decided to pick up Ty...go for ice cream at Baskin and Robbins....and then head out to the Community Observatory that is located out at the college. I have been wanting to do this for quite some time...and...I'm sure glad we did it! We arrived a little bit earlier that 8:30pm....which turned out to be perfect....(I was able to snap some great photos)...we started up the path to the conservatory which sits all by itself on top of a small hill....it was so peaceful and quiet...nobody else around....it was like we were in a different dimension...at the top we were greeted by 3 docents who were so friendly and nice...and very informative...Everyone entered the observatory...and WOW!!!!!! How cool this was! The telescopes (2 of them) are in this room and the ceiling is open for night-sky viewing..Well it turns out we could not have planned this little adventure any better because it just so happens on June 30th (last night) we were able to see Venus from Saturn..a spectacular pairing! Both planets appear in the same field of view in a telescope. The BEST planet conjunction of 2007. It really was spectacular...Venus looked very bright and looked just like the moon...and Saturn with it's rings was awesome looking...We also got to view star clusters...galaxies...a double star which are two stars that appear close to each other in the sky; either linked by gravity so that they orbit each other (binary star) or lying at different distances from Earth (optical double).We saw a Globular Star Cluster which is a ball-shaped group of several thousand old stars....and a Diffuse Nebula which is a cloud of gas illuminated by other nearby stars. Another spectacular site we saw was Jupiter with 4 of it's biggest moons...and Jupiter has 60 moons! This was so AWESOME!!!!!! The galaxy we saw was called a Sombrero Galaxy because it was shaped like a sombrero...a flat disc shape with the brightness in the middle...ANYWAY.....you get the picture! I could go on and on...I am so excited about this...and I plan on going back to the observatory...alot! Not very many people showed up...so we practically had the place and the outrageous telescopes all to ourselves! I told Andy that I WANT a really cool telescope now! I had one years ago...but don't know whatever happened to it...they have really fabulous telescopes that you can buy for under 300.00... that are digital! Is that cool or what!!!????Oh......one more thing..it was a full moon last night...(the second full moon in June)....COOL !!!

8 Comments:

What a wonderful experience, I cannot remember if I have been to one. I can't believe that! Ok, another to-do on the list of weekend activities (this one would be a night one of course) That was a great idea for the 3 of you AND to hopefully get a telescope of your own! XOXO

Fantastic Vicci. We have been watching Venus, (with the naked eye)as it appears so brightly at the moment, in the N.W.I would have loved seeing it through one of those telescopes..!We have a telescope, it's not bad, but there are too many lights from the city, reflecting in the night sky, for us to see anything clearly. Being in the mountains, you would probably have great vision.hugsxoxo

Oh I know you loved doing that!!! How fun!! We didn't get to see the moon last night, too many clouds. We have a great observatory here in Nashville and I have always wanted to go, you have convinced me that I should now!HOpe you have a great week, girlie!xooxoxoxo

Catching up over here. I enjoyed your sharing about the observatory. I've been to Griffiths a few times. Wow is all i can say about that!! I keep getting behind at my favorite blogs...too much going on...but I think I'm caught up now.. enjoyed reading you today. sandy